- Publication date
- 2006
- Usage
- Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International




- Topics
- nu, nu.nl, nu nl, cartoon, cartoons, spotprent, spotprenten, satire, nederlands, nederlandse, sanoma, dpg media, nieuws, news, 3d, 3ds max, vray, metin seven, seven's heaven, sevens heaven, sevensheaven, 2000s, nrc, nrc.next, nrc next
- Language
- Dutch
- Item Size
- 738.9M
In October 2006, the Dutch illustrator Metin Seven started creating daily cartoons reflecting news topics on the popular Dutch NU.nl news site. Next to this, Metin created cartoons with a weekly frequency for the NRC.next newspaper, which were published starting in March 2006. A selection of the NRC.next cartoons is included among the image files. They've got a landscape orientation.
These were the world's first news cartoons executed in 3D CG, decades before the introduction of generative AI. They reflect contemporary 2000s news topics, and each cartoon includes the referenced news headline at the top. Almost all cartoons contain Dutch language, but some English translations are present.
In a corner of each cartoon there is a Seven's Heaven signature, which was Metin's one-man company name and pseudonym at the time. Please note that the sevensheaven URL and Twitter profile mentioned in the cartoons are not applicable anymore. Metin's homepage is metinseven.nl and his Twitter profile is @metinse7en, but he's more active on Mastodon than on Twitter.
A strongly stylized 3D approach was needed in order to be able to produce the cartoons in around a few hours. There was usually no time for refinement of the 3D scenes, such as proper texturing or more detailed 3D modeling. During the early stages of the cartoon series, Metin was still experimenting with the style, until a final form of the characters, props and decors was established.
Metin used Autodesk 3ds Max with the V-Ray renderer at the time, and occasionally the Maxwell renderer. The NU.nl cartoons needed to fit in a fixed region of the mid-2000s NU.nl site dimensions, so they were rendered in a resolution of 364 x 464 pixels. Before uploading the cartoons to the Internet Archive, they were enlarged using an ESRGAN AI upscaling model, hence some image artifacts and rough edges.
The daily routine was as follows:
- Browsing through the many news articles to find something suitable for a cartoon.
- Thinking up a suitable gag, and figuring out an effective 3D depiction.
- Creating, lighting and rendering the 3D scene.
- Sending it to NU.nl or NRC.next before expiration of the daily or weekly deadline.
The NU.nl visitor interest in Metin's 3D cartoons grew as time progressed. According to the public NU.nl statistics at the time, the cartoons were sometimes viewed around 70,000 times a day, and the NRC.next newspaper reached more than 300,000 Dutch and Flemish readers per day.
In September 2008, the NU.nl cartoon frequency changed from daily to weekly, and after a period of six years and eight months, creation of the cartoons was discontinued in May 2013.
- Addeddate
- 2023-04-17 14:29:29
- Identifier
- nu_nl_cartoons_by_metin_seven_aka_sevens_heaven
- Scanner
- Internet Archive HTML5 Uploader 1.7.0
- Year
- 2006
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